


That Frothing Knob

by Pride_of_Six



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Accidental Knotting, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, First Time Bottoming, Fluff and Angst, Knotting, M/M, Mates Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski, Meet-Cute, POV Derek, Rich Derek, Top Derek Hale/Bottom Stiles Stilinski
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-05
Updated: 2018-01-21
Packaged: 2018-12-24 06:38:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12007149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pride_of_Six/pseuds/Pride_of_Six
Summary: Stiles was wiping down the spout of a machine with a cloth, and Derek almost popped a stiffy right there in the café. It was completely embarrassing that after so many years of control over both his human and wolf side Derek would find himself so… enamoured by this random. Regardless, the wolf wants what the wolf wants, and Derek found himself trying his darnedest to get some sort of a rise out of Stiles, “You sure know how to handle that frothing knob.”Needless to say, Derek got to see that beautiful blush colouring the barista’s face once again.--AKA Derek is a rich CEO and Stiles is a poor barista. They laugh, they love, and they live.





	1. Warming

The first time Derek saw Stiles, he was sweating and brewing and humming and perfect. Derek was running late for a particularly stressful meeting, one that he wasn’t necessarily comfortable skipping out on, and apparently he had hit the rush hour of coffee buying. It was like the universe had set up a series of events to really rend his patience until he got more and more frustrated and—

And then it didn’t really matter, because Derek caught a glimpse of the hot barista behind the counter and it was like he knew, at first sight, that he’d stumbled upon something special. See, Derek wasn’t quite the playboy that magazines made the successful CEO of the Hale Corporation out to be. In-fact, it might have been years since his last sexually intimate relationship with someone, so it was more than unsettling to be affected this way by someone at just a first glance.

Some romantics might call it true love or fate or destiny or whatever, but Derek felt like it was more likely just a kind of animalistic lust that he was feeling. Which was all the more possible given that he was, y’know, secretly a werewolf. He didn’t really have time to explore it now, anyway, but he also knew that he couldn’t dismiss someone who instilled such a rare primal reaction from him. It came to be his turn to make his order and he did his best to put on a flirty smile as he wracked the unused corners of his brain for a good pickup line.

“I’ve always wanted to bang a lawyer… you’re a barista, right?”

It wasn’t his best, and for a moment he was afraid that he didn’t get it, but the then-stranger blushed and snorted in such open amusement that Derek considered it good enough. “What can I get you, sir?”

“I’d like to get,” he drawled out, pretending to peruse the menu just to prolong their conversation, “a large black coffee, and,” he drew out the ‘and’ to measure a couple seconds before throwing down his ace, “your name.”

“One coffee incoming,” he retorted, still blushing even if he was trying to be nonchalant, “and my name is Stiles.”

“Nice to meet you, Stiles,” he had said, even as he was shepherded across to receive his coffee from a different, less attractive barista. 

And that’s how Derek had gotten a name to assign to that perfect face, and also how Derek had started his new side-project of seducing the heck out of the sexy barista.

-

For the first few weeks following their meeting, Derek had played it cool. He was a busy man, after all, and he wasn’t about to fall head over heels for some random barista. He had a perfectly functional coffee machine in his office and he really had no need to return to the coffee shop where Stiles worked.

Regardless, in the third week Derek resolved to humour his hindbrain and go to the coffee shop again. Just to ‘see if there was still a spark’, he told himself.

Needless to say, there was still a spark. Oh, hell was there a spark. It was like all the time they had been separated there was a static electricity building up between them, and now that Derek had let them get too close again that static was arcing violently around them.

In their second meeting, Stiles was wiping down the spout of a machine with a cloth as he took Derek’s order, and Derek almost popped a stiffy right there in the café. It was unacceptable, and completely embarrassing that after so many years of control over both his human and wolf side Derek would find himself so… enamoured by this random. Regardless, the wolf wants what the wolf wants, and Derek found himself still trying his darnedest to get some sort of a rise out of Stiles, “You sure know how to handle that frothing knob.”

Needless to say, Derek got to see that beautiful blush colouring the barista’s face once again.

It quickly became torture for Derek’s wolf to even catch a whiff of coffee without throwing a bit of Stiles’ scent into the mix, so Derek abandoned making his own coffee in favour of visiting Stiles every morning. It was going to be more expensive in the long run because he had a perfectly good coffee machine going to waste in his office, but somehow his days seemed that much more bright when he had one of Stiles’ coffee’s and the ghost of the man’s smile to warm him.

After about a week of flirting, Stiles apparently realised that Derek wasn’t just leading him on and he finally got the confidence to flirt back. It still caught Derek off-guard, though.

“I could grind that for you, Stiles,” Derek had said, dripping as much suggestion into his tone as possible as he intently watched Stiles’ hands work. It had just become a part of his day, dropping a pickup line on Stiles and Stiles blushing and then professionally making Derek his coffee.

“You good at grinding, hm?” Stiles had innocently queried. It wasn’t even comparable to the kind of sexual things Derek was used to hearing on a daily basis, but for some reason just the fact that Stiles had finally taken the initiative to involve himself in Derek’s flirting had Derek’s heart pounding excitedly, wildly.

He leaned a little more over the counter, trying to get closer to Stiles and just wishing he could bury his nose in the juncture of his neck, as he eagerly replied, “Yeah, the best.” His voice might have also dropped a couple octaves, but who was counting, anyway? “I’d be happy to show you sometime.”

Stiles snorted, but Derek could hear and smell what Stiles wasn’t expressing because he was too shy. “What’s your name?”

“Derek,” he immediately responded, because the fact that Stiles wasn’t aware of who Derek was somehow just excited him more. He wasn’t exactly super-famous, but in this city it was kind of hard to go somewhere without being recognised. If Stiles didn’t know about his immense wealth and success then it would be something Derek could casually spring on him to help win him over.

“Well, Derek,” Stiles whispered in a voice that Derek could tell was an attempt at being suave. He could feel a gentle but incessant urge in the back of his mind the moment he heard Stiles’ say his name. It was the urge to claim. “If you’re interested, I’d love to take you to dinner some time.”

And yes! Stiles and he were going to go on a date! He’d said yes! Except, no, it hadn’t quite panned out that way, had it?

“Oh no, no,” Derek interjected and quickly amended his answer when he saw the hurt flash across Stiles’ face, “I’m taking YOU to dinner some time.” Stiles’ expression suggested he was seriously relieved that Derek hadn’t turned him down based on the massive grin that took over his features.

“Alright, if you must,” Stiles feigned like it was such a bother, and Derek could already tell he was going to have a lot of fun in the near future with this man.

They agreed to have their dinner that very night, exchanged numbers, and then they went their separate ways. As soon as he crossed the threshold of his office building he was assailed by his sister and business partner, Laura, who had apparently picked up on his bliss and had to ruin it by interrogating him.

“Oh my god, who are you and what have you done with my brother?” she teased, but even her sisterly ways weren’t enough to smother his radiant happiness.

Tonight he had a date with Stiles. Stiles and he had a date tonight. A date with Stiles would be had tonight. Every which way he worded it just sounded so perfect and he could not wait to get a bit more personally acquainted with the barista.

Apparently his sexual tension must have been palpable because Laura stormed out with a half-amused, half-disgusted shout of, “Gross, Der.”

-

The entire day Derek could barely do any of his regular work because he would find himself staring off dreamily into space every few minutes. He’d never tell anybody, but he was finding himself almost nervous for the night’s date. Derek Hale, big shot CEO, multi-millionaire, werewolf, etc, etc, was nervous for a date with some barista he met a couple weeks ago.

In spite of his anxiety, the day progressed and the night came and Derek set out to Stiles’ neighbourhood with his heart trying to beat a harsh rhythm out of his chest.

His prized Camaro was like a sleek panther stalking through the streets of the big city in search of prey—in search of Stiles. It was a beautiful car. Even if he had the money to get something more practical or perhaps something even flashier, the car had a lot of sentimental value to him that outweighed any other vehicle he might choose.

So it went without saying that when he followed the GPS’s instruction and turned right onto Stiles’ street, he was kind of winded by the realisation that his car was probably worth more than every other car on the street. It felt like he’d turned a corner and suddenly he wasn’t in the city anymore, he was in the slums. It was like the very foundations of the buildings around him were crumbling in his periphery.

And it might have been his privilege talking, but Derek could not imagine anybody living here ever, let alone someone so precious like Stiles. It felt… dangerous.

He pulled up where the GPS told him to, and then he checked the address Stiles had sent him one more time just to be sure he wasn’t mistaken. But it was correct: Stiles, the hot barista which Derek was going on a date with, lived in this—this—there weren’t even words to describe where Stiles lived.

He pulled out his phone and texted Stiles that he was out front and waited. He heard a door open and close on the second floor followed by the excited beating of a heart that had to be Stiles’ as he ran down a set of stairs that creaked a bit too much for Derek’s liking.

“Stilinski!” a croaky voiced man shouted from inside and Stiles stopped. Derek couldn’t see what was happening, so he was relying only on his werewolf hearing to give him to go of what was going on inside.

“Stiles Stilinski,” Derek muttered out loud, incredulously, to himself, “seriously?”

“I’m still working on this month’s rent, Mr Raeken,” Stiles assured the man that had to be his land lord.

“You know I prefer it when you call me Theo,” the man tutted and Derek’s hackles were rising before he could even get a look at the guy’s face. “And you know there are other methods of payment…”

And woah, Derek had never found himself so ready to kill a human before in his life. Thankfully, just as he was ready to burst out of the Camaro, storm the building and murder the man that dared speak to Stiles like that, his date came out the door with a little wave.

Stiles made his way over to the car and hopped in the passenger seat and suddenly Derek felt as though Stiles was safe.

He gently reached across and sort of awkwardly rubbed the back of his hand on Stiles’ neck. Because Stiles was safest with Derek by his side, in Derek’s car, with Derek’s scent on him. It just seemed natural.

“I love it when a man paws at me before dinner,” Stiles jested with a roll of his eyes.

“Yeah, well, any time you need a man to paw at you, I’m your guy,” Derek meant it as a joke, but it came out as a bit of a command. He cleared his throat, hoping that the rest of his words lost some of their intensity because of it, “So, uh, dinner.”

Stiles nodded, and he had a quizzical expression like Derek was a particularly intriguing riddle. “Dinner,” he agreed.

-

The whole time they were at the fancy and expensive restaurant Derek had picked, Stiles looked like a fish out of water. He was gaping at everything and asking for certain aspects of the menu to be explained to him and the whole situation was just so freaking endearing that Derek wanted to scoop Stiles up in his arms and hide him away from the rest of the world so he could keep him for himself.

They talked about fun things like how Stiles played lacrosse, and how Derek enjoyed travelling. They talked about awkward things like how Derek was kind of a millionaire and how Stiles’ name wasn’t really Stiles. They talked about real things like Stiles’ mum, who had passed away when he was a kid, and Derek’s whole family, excluding Laura, Cora and his uncle Peter, who had been murdered when he was a teenager. And then, ultimately, they also talked about sexy things, like how Stiles had never actually been with a man, and how Derek loved the idea of ‘showing him the ropes’, as it were.

When the time came to pay the bill, Stiles made a valiant argument that they were ‘both the dudes in the relationship’ so they were going to go Dutch, but Derek would have none of it. He’d heard that Stiles was struggling with the rent for that ruin he lived in. Even paying for the meagre meal he had at the restaurant might just have bankrupted the poor barista. It took Derek literally holding Stiles down to pay the bill himself, and he might have used a bit of werewolf strength, but all’s well that ends well.

Except it didn’t really end well, because when the night came to an end and they were driving back to Stiles’ place in Derek’s car, it occurred to Derek that he was just delivering Stiles back to that perverted land lord and that terrible building. And while a part of Derek knew that Stiles had to have some serious strength and wits about him if he had handled himself thus far, another, stronger part of Derek was screaming at him to just take Stiles home with him. Take the little human back to his home, his nest, and just hold him there in his arms until the world looked kind enough to let him out again. Stiles was talking enough for the both of them on the ride back, thankfully, so Derek’s miserable silence wasn’t as obvious as it should have been.

He parked outside the shoddy excuse for a building where Stiles lived and then turned and levelled the man with his most pleading look he could muster.

“Wow, dude, did I just declare myself an enemy to the crown or something? Geez.”

Okay, maybe Derek’s pleading look was overshadowed a little by his general frustration at Stiles not saying something like, ‘Derek, I love you. Please kill my land lord and then take me to your house where you can spend the rest of your life thoroughly sexing me’. He scowled at Stiles and then grunted out something unintelligible.

“Excuse me?”

“I said, do you want to see where I live?” Derek repeated, this time in human words instead of growly werewolf noises. It was a wonder people remained oblivious to werewolves in the world when they could be as emotional as he was.

“Uh,” Stiles looked a bit taken aback by the question and he shuffled a bit closer to the door as if he was expecting Derek to kidnap him or something. Perhaps he would. “Not tonight, big guy.”

As much as it pleased Derek to hear Stiles call him ‘big guy’, his pleasure was shrivelled by the reality that Stiles was about to get out of his car and go and sleep under the same mouldy, decrepit roof as some man that wanted to jump him. “Wait,” Derek hazarded, trying to remember how to speak without sounding like a creeper, “I just—Stiles, I don’t like this neighbourhood. It’s not—” he flared his nostrils raggedly like he was auditioning to be a dragon, “Stiles if I leave you here tonight I’m going to spend all night worrying about you.”

Stiles gave him a look that was part awe and part anger, and the silence stretched between them uncomfortably until the human finally relented and broke it. “Good night, Derek,” Stiles sighed out and Derek wanted to maul something because that wasn’t what he wanted to hear. He wanted to hear Stiles acquiescing to Derek’s will. He wanted to hear the human agree that where he lived sucked in epic proportions, and that he would unquestionably be much happier at Derek’s place. He wanted to hear anything, really, but a ‘good night’ which was comparable to a ‘good bye’.

“But Stiles—” Derek started, more than ready to list the myriad of reasons why he should come back to Derek’s apartment, but he suddenly found himself unable to continue because of a misplaced pair of lips.

They weren’t on his mouth or anywhere else more erogenous, much to Derek’s dismay, but rather Stiles had taken the initiative to just gently peck him awkwardly on the cheek. Huh.

It probably didn’t mean much, and it might have just been a sneaky ploy by Stiles to distract Derek from the issue at hand, but something inside the werewolf relaxed because of the gesture. They bid each other farewell, Derek sticking around until he heard Stiles’ door to his apartment close to signify he’d made it the short walk from the Camaro to his apartment without the structure breaking or his land lord accosting him. The werewolf’s mind was still caught up on the chaste kiss, though. It meant that the evening wasn’t ruined in the last few minutes, and perhaps that would be enough for Derek tonight.

Key word: ‘tonight’.

-

After their date, it became glaringly obvious that Derek had caught… feelings. It was never his intention, nor had it been his intention to get so preoccupied with thoughts of Stiles that he almost forgot to come into work. Alas, his intent did not matter because the reality was there.

He’d always considered himself rather aloof; he was always too proud to text people first, and he would generally be the first to end a conversation because it felt better if he had control. With Stiles, all of his understanding of himself was thrown to the wind, because he found himself texting the barista scores of times throughout the day just to let him know if he’d seen something funny or ask how business was across the road.

On his lunch break, wherein he usually would remain in his office and still work the hour (if only because he was less likely to be interrupted when on lunch), he now exited the building and went to spend it with his cute little barista buddy.

And Derek might have been projecting, but it also seemed like Stiles was having ‘feelings’ about them, too. He could hear it in Stiles’ heart how excited he got when Derek walked in the door, and he could smell the little traces of arousal that Stiles unleashed when Derek would ‘accidentally’ brush against him.

Things between them were good, great in-fact.

Which is why, naturally, the universe had to come screw everything up. Entropy and balance and all that shit.

Because on an unsuspecting Tuesday, when Derek went down on his lunchbreak to bask in Stiles’ presence, there was already somebody there doing that.

“Oh my god, Derek!” Stiles greeted him with more gusto than Derek had ever witnessed the human express, but even Stiles’ bubbly mood couldn’t alleviate the solid weight that had settled in his gut the moment he stepped through the establishment’s doors. “There’s someone I’d really like you to meet!”

And then Derek was being dragged over to the booth where Stiles and he usually spent around forty-five minutes together, alone, every day. But not this day, because there was some stupid man there with them. And the stupid man’s scent was all over Stiles so they’d probably been profusely hugging or something before Derek came and it made Derek sick to his stomach. It should be his scent all over Stiles, damn it!

“This is Scott, and he’s, like, my bestest bro in the world,” Stiles introduced him and Derek was more than happy to learn the name of his competition. He looked scrawny enough, so if it came down to it Derek figured he could probably deal with him without much trouble. ‘Bestest bro’ or not, there was far too much touchy-feely between them for Derek’s liking.

Stiles took his seat opposite Scott in the booth, and Derek followed him down to sit right beside him. He might have been squashing Stiles into the wall a bit, but it was kind of the only way he could subtly rub the side of his body on Stiles to cover up Scott’s frankly flowery scent.

“How was your day, Stiles?” Derek asked instead of acknowledging the third party. It was safe territory for them to ask about each other’s days.

The man in question’s eyes were kind of erratically darting between Derek’s and Scott’s, and it was as if he was having a separate, silent conversation which Derek was not a part of. “It was great. Got a pay-rise,” Stiles sing-songed the last word, “an extra dollar fifty and hour, baby. Boo-yah!”

Derek smirked a bit fondly at Stiles’ excitement and had to bite his tongue to hold back from bringing up something stupid like Derek’s own salary or if Stiles’ pay increase meant he could afford to live in a safer neighbourhood than his current one. Those topics were bound to breed discontent.

“Are you gonna move into a better place, now?” Scott asked, and for a moment Derek had to check that he hadn’t accidentally uttered the words himself and projected them on to Scott. But no, Stiles’ ‘best bro’ had taken the words right out of his mouth. Perhaps he and Derek could get along after all.

“Ugh,” Stiles groaned, “You sound like Derek. Yes, I know where I’m currently living kinda-sorta sucks—”

Scott butted in, “You mean it’s literally the worst place ever, run by the worst person ever?”

“Perhaps,” Stiles humoured him, “but it’s mine, and while I don’t love waking up covered with a layer of dust or having to string along my land lord so he won’t be as harsh with the rent, I do love having my independence.”

The subject was apparently turned moot after Stiles’ declaration, so Derek did something assertive: he spoke to Scott.

“So how did you two meet?”

-

Half an hour later and Derek not only knew so much more about Stiles’ best bro, he also knew a heck of a lot more about Stiles himself. They were just little things like how Stiles loved video games or how he’d eat nothing but curly fries if given the chance, but Derek treasured the intel Scott provided him because it was from the period of life Derek had decided to dub: ‘B.D., aka Before Derek’. And if Derek wanted the ‘Derek Era’ of Stiles’ life to reign forevermore, which he did, then he had to be able to properly woo him, because while their dinner-date had been successful, it also was a bit impersonal.

When Scott bid his farewell with a promise to catch up with Stiles again soon, Derek pounced on the opportunity afford to him in the last few minutes of their lunchbreaks.

“Do you have any plans tonight?”

“No, why?” Stiles asked before taking a long slurp of his coffee.

“Because I was wondering if you wanted to come over to mine and play video games while eating curly fries.”

There were three beats of Derek’s heart; three beats of deafening silence, before Stiles threw his head back and started laughing uproariously. Like people turned in their seats and gave them dirty looks he was laughing so maniacally. Derek could care less, though, because it was the first time he had seen Stiles laugh like that; laughing so hard that he unwittingly barred his beautiful neck to Derek. It took more than a modicum of self-control for Derek to convince himself that it wasn’t the tantalising offer that it looked like; it was just Stiles being animated as he laughed.

“Wow, I am so glad that I introduced you to Scott. Hell yeah, it’s a date.”  
And that’s how Derek got his second date with Stiles Stilinski, barista extraordinaire.

-

Derek would have to say that the second date wasn’t quite as much his kind of thing as the first had been, and it was partly because Stiles was so much better than him at all the games they played.

Derek was all up for establishing some dominance over the hot little human, but apparently fate had other plans as Stiles turned out to be a far more accomplished gamer than he’d anticipated. He even pulled out all the stops when he subtly infused his senses with some werewolf power to better his reaction time, but still the human beat him into submission.

What happened after the date, though, was definitely Derek’s speed. Because Derek may not have been able to beat Stiles into submission in the game, but he could definitely do it in bed.

“Fuck, Derek,” Stiles groaned as Derek threw him bodily down onto his bed. “Wow, you’re so hot.”

It was so nice to just have Stiles completely wrapped up in Derek’s scent that the wolf’s speaking faculties were a little bit limited. There was so much blood rushing southward to give in to his baser instincts and so much pressure rushing upwards to reign in his wolf so he didn’t accidentally hurt or scare Stiles; it felt like he was being pulled in two different directions as he alternated pressing loving kisses to Stiles’ flesh and gnawing hard on every bit of Stiles he could mark with his teeth.

“God, Derek, I’ve been so horny since I first saw your stupidly pretty face,” Stiles rambled and Derek rumbled. They were a match made in heaven, really. “So stupidly pretty. And now I know you’re actually funny and rich, too? Damn, I’ve gotta kind of wonder what the catch is.”

“I’m the catch,” Derek commented in a voice that might have been a bit more werewolf than human, but he could just pretend it was the heat of the moment.

Stiles chuckled as Derek promptly pulled off Stiles’ trousers and undies, the last garment of clothing separating them. “You sure are, but, uh…”

Derek heard the sudden nervousness bleeding into his tone and put a little bit of space between them. They were both completely naked, and Derek was kind-of-sort-of keeping Stiles wedged between him and the bed, but Derek had to remind himself that Stiles didn’t know what to expect from having sex with a man; let alone having sex with a werewolf. “Do you want us to stop?” Derek asked, even though the idea of stopping pained him and made him want to howl.

“No, of course not, but maybe… maybe you could just, like, stick it in me and we’ll see how we feel from there.”

Derek grinned down at Stiles’ earnest expression, how unsure he was, and couldn’t help but have a little titter to himself. Stiles could have asked him to go and put on cowboy boots and spurs and start whipping him and Derek would have still made it happen. Because as much as Derek was invested in the awesome sex that they were about to receive, he was also aware that this time it was important that Stiles called the shots with Derek there with him as a kind of mentor. Whatever future sex they had would be built off of this moment, so it was imperative that they did it right.

“Yes, Stiles. I’ll gladly ‘stick it in you’,” Derek deadpanned, already grabbing the lube and slicking himself and Stiles up. Fingering Stiles was the sweetest torture because he got to feel Stiles’ velvety muscles squeezing around his digits, but he also had to stretch him well enough and long enough that they didn’t risk any tearing when Derek got to actually pushing inside him. His dick was swinging rock hard between his legs, tragically ignored until the main event.

“Jesus, I can’t take any more of that,” Stiles gasped out and he unceremoniously kicked Derek in the shoulder to get him to quit it with the teasing. “I’m ready by now, surely,” he was panting as he spoke, and Derek was suddenly aware of how focussed his senses were on Stiles. It was like his usual aura of awareness and security his werewolf powers afforded him had been abandoned in favour of concentrating every iota of his being on Stiles. He could hear every breath, feel every muscle, and he could smell every drop of arousal Stiles leaked onto his own belly.

Derek felt like time was moving in slow motion as he finally, finally, lined his pelvis up with Stiles’ body. It looked so concerning from his perspective: his massive member was gonna just get shoved hard into the human’s poor unsuspecting passage. Well, maybe not unsuspecting… but the fearful anticipation was still there! Sure Derek had performed sexual acts before, and each of his few partners had successfully accommodated him, but none of them looked so breakable as Stiles; none of them needed so much protection and caring from the outside world and—

“Oh my god just do it already you stupid hunk.”

Well, who was Derek to withhold from Stiles anything he wanted? Especially if it was mutually beneficial. He thrust forward with a snarl of satisfaction as the dewy head of his cock pushed passed the first ring of muscle and then—

“Wait!” Stiles called before he could push any further and Derek pulled out with an enormous amount of self-control. He kind-of doubled over because his senses were so heightened and so overwhelmed and just planted himself face-first into Stiles’ navel for now because it was the only way he was going to keep himself sane. “Don’t you need a condom or something?”

Derek’s first instinct was to say, ‘actually, I’m a werewolf and because of that I’m not worried about infecting you or getting infected with something’, but instead he said the much more reasonable and normal thing which was: “I’m clean, Stiles. And I trust that you’re clean too.”

Stiles made a kind of vague ‘you’re the boss’ kind of affirmation and then Derek once again went through the torturous bliss that was burying himself balls-deep in his hot barista boyfriend. And yep, they’d never really officially discussed what they were, but Derek was coining the term ‘boyfriend’ for them from this moment onwards. Perhaps an even stronger word like ‘mate’ was in order, but that might just freak Stiles out at the given time, so ‘boyfriend’ would have to do.

Once he was finally, properly and beautifully seated inside Stiles, he let himself have a moment to just revel in the perfect things in life. This, having Stiles in his bed with his face scrunched up in pleasure-pain and his ass full of Derek’s dick, was one such perfect thing.

“Wow, I don’t think I’m gonna last very long,” Stiles admitted, and for some reason that spurred Derek into action. He started to piston his hips back and forth into Stiles relentlessly because Derek had to make this amazing for Stiles. He had to make Stiles see stars and transcend this plane of existence and just generally have a great time because this was one of his first times, and he had given it to Derek.

He focussed on when Stiles’ breath hitched or when his scent would spike and his dick would jump to indicate when he was doing something right. The harsh slap of their hips meeting again and again might have sounded rough, but it was apparently doing wonders for Stiles so Derek was more than happy to oblige.

Derek snarled a little as he felt his own release rapidly approaching him out of nowhere. ‘Too soon’, he told himself and his wolf threatened to break its way out before he pulled his head together and pulled out of Stiles with a satisfying wet ‘pop!’

“Fuck,” Stiles panted, “you can’t just—”

Derek threw a hand up and smothered it over Stiles’ face to shut him up, because his whole body was still humming and Stiles’ fucked-out voice wasn’t helping matters in the slightest. He needed to have control, damn it.

“Okay,” Derek decided after a moment. He sounded a little bit fucked-out himself, really. “Okay,” he repeated, unmuting Stiles by removing his hand and then gently tapping the side of the human’s face in a gesture he hoped expressed that they were almost there, just a little while longer.

He pushed back inside and then thrust a dozen times in lightning succession as he tugged the length of Stiles’ member on every other thrust.

“F-f-f—oh!” Stiles half-shouted half-gasped as if he was shocked himself by how intense it was. Derek could see on his face as he milked Stiles through his orgasm that he was having the time of his life, and Derek considered it a massive win for him. “Oh, Derek, Jesus!”

Derek had never heard Stiles express so much blasphemy, but it was pretty hot, and even if they were smote Derek would consider it totally worth it. Derek tried to gently pull out without hurting Stiles, but as he pulled back, Stiles’ body followed him like they were… like they were stuck together. “What the f—”

If Stiles’ blasphemy was bad, Derek’s was something else entirely. The pleasure of his own orgasm hit him like a freight train and an aeroplane and a rocket and a whale and all the massive things that would floor someone if they hit them. He spouted off words he invented in that moment for the sole purpose of expressing how fucking amazing it felt to be inside Stiles right then and there, because Derek had knotted Stiles. On the topic of firsts, Derek had never knotted any of his bedfellows. He could usually bring himself to that precipice if he had the time and the tools to work up to it, but never in his thirty years of life had he found himself feeling so completely fulfilled.

Maybe some deep primal part of him recognised their chemistry the moment they met that fateful day in the coffee shop and that’s why Derek was so unable to get Stiles out of his head. Maybe he’d stayed single all these years because he was waiting around for somebody like Stiles to turn his world upside down in the best possible way. Maybe fate and destiny and true love and all that crap were actually real… or maybe Derek had just gotten lucky and found himself a super, incredible and compatible boyfr—mate.

There were going to be questions in the morning, questions that might put their still fledgling relationship to the test. Questions like: ‘why do you have a knot?’ and ‘are you a werewolf?’ and ‘can I move in to this lovely apartment so we can bang all day, every day?’

Perhaps that last one was a bit farfetched and hopeful.

As Derek looked down, sated, at Stiles’ blissed-out face, he came to realise that whatever the obstacles that they faced on the road to a lasting and beautiful relationship, they would overcome them together.

Besides, if Derek’s dick was so good that it literally made Stiles pass out then surely the human would be able to look past the fact that it was a werewolf dick.

Surely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally wasn't going to write the explicit bit but here we are.


	2. Complicated

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath

Derek woke up feeling like he’d been doing some _heavy_ drinking the night before. As in heavy wolfsbane-laced drinking. There was a massive smudge in his vision and an even greater smudge on his memory. His body was telling him that he’d just been rudely awakened, but he couldn’t hear any obnoxious noises, and there wasn’t any scent of smoke or _danger_. All he was picking up on was… oh!

“Oh!” Derek gasped out a sound and clutched, well, he clutched _Stiles’ ass_ because it was _there_. What was it doing there?

“Mm, Derek,” Stiles hummed in his sleep and Derek held his breath for a moment like Stiles waking up was the absolute worst thing that could happen. Maybe it was?

With the force of a hammer to the skull, it all came flooding back: their second date, the sex, and, of course, the _knotting_ which occurred. Even the thought of it made Derek blush because it was just so intimate. It felt like he’d given Stiles a part of himself so completely that even Derek himself wasn’t entitled to it anymore. The only thing he’d ever knotted in the past was his own fist, but now looking back on those occasions it felt like he could never, ever, not ever bring himself to do it again unless Stiles was with him. Derek only just woke up, and already he was practically having a panic attack because of _feelings_. Is this what mates felt like?

Stiles snuffled a little into the pillow— _Derek’s pillow_ –before falling back into a blissful sleep.

Derek, however, was far, far away from feeling blissful. Because the moment Stiles fully regained consciousness, he would _leave_. He would leave Derek because even a first-timer like him would recognise that what Derek did to him was not normal homosexual practice. It wasn’t even normal homosapien practice!

Derek let out the breath he’d been holding for god-knows how long and let himself feel sorry for himself for a minute. Years and years of persevering in the face of disastrous relationships, murder, and having to hide who he was, only to finally, _finally_ find somebody who he could really connect with on all kinds of levels, and have it all taken away from him because he lost control and unceremoniously outed himself as inhuman.

When Derek thought about their future (there was no kidding himself anymore; he’d been thinking about it since the day they first met), he imagined telling Stiles over a romantic, candlelit dinner after a few more weeks together. Afterwards, Stiles would tell Derek that it didn’t matter, that he was just ‘Derek’, and that nothing had changed between them. Then, Stiles, being the curious lad he was, would ask for Derek to show him the shift. Derek would be shy at first, hesitant to lay himself bare like that, but he’d do it for Stiles. He’d do anything for Stiles. Then in Derek’s imagination, Stiles wouldn’t be afraid. Maybe he’d even be _into it_ and ask for Derek to shift and use some of his extra strength to _fuck harder_ and _faster_. It was a nice thought, but it was just that: a thought.

It didn’t matter now, though, because even Derek’s daydreams were going to be tainted by Stiles’ rejection. It shouldn’t be possible, but the pain was so intense that he could feel it retroactively. It was like he was those final moments in a car crash and every cell in his body was bracing for the impact as he hurtled towards pure agony.

Or maybe Derek was being dramatic. Stiles was an exceptionally kind and accepting person, so maybe it wouldn’t even cross his mind that—

Stiles huffed against the pillow again and stirred. For a moment Derek thought he might fall back to sleep again, give him a few more moments to prepare something convincing and reassuring to tell him, but then Stiles’ heart started to beat just a bit faster than the steady rhythm of sleep, and Derek knew it was coming.

“Stiles?” Derek uttered his name with so much apprehension his voice quaked, and it almost looked like Stiles was shaking too, except—

He wasn’t. It was Derek who was shaking. Derek who had at some point in the past few seconds wrapped his arms and a leg around Stiles and pulled him tight against his chest. It felt like he was watching himself in third person, watching some sad, lonely man clinging desperately to somebody who didn’t want to be there anymore. It was that thought that finally gave Derek the resolve to let Stiles go and sit up in bed.

Stiles, for what it was worth, wasn’t exactly panicking. His heart was beating just a bit faster than normal, the air wasn’t stagnant with any anxiety or fear apart from Derek’s own, and above all else Stiles was, well, still there. He was also exceptionally quiet, which was awful because ever since Derek met Stiles he hadn’t been quiet like this. And without Stiles talking, Derek felt far too isolated to crack the silence himself. Last night things had been perfect and beautiful and fun, but now they were just two people sitting in a stretch of silence on a bed that was _filthy_ and—

“Stiles,” someone whined, and Derek was unsurprised that it was him at this point. It was a guttural keening sound unlike anything Derek had uttered before. Different to his whines of grief following the fire, or the whines of pain when he was being tortured by hunters, this wasn’t born from an emotion as simple as sadness or anger. This was born from _love_ , but Stiles was a human, so of course he wouldn’t see it that way.

“Shut up!” Stiles yelled, and it was the first real reaction he’d had since waking up, so Derek counted it as a win as he choked off on his pathetic noises. Stiles was going to think he was so _needy_. “I need to think for a second, please.”

And there it was, the increased heart rate, the tang of fear. Stiles was fine before Derek made him acknowledge there was a problem, but now Derek could practically witness Stiles’ thought process as it played out: ‘ _I’m in bed with a werewolf, and I just told him to shut up! Is he mad? Is he going to eat me?_ ’. It was awful being able to read Stiles so well both personally and with his enhanced senses that it was practically mind-reading. Stiles was scared of him, and all Derek could come up with to fix this was the desperate ravings of his wolf-brain: _bite him; lock him up; fuck him to sleep again_. He had no idea what to do because he’d never had to do it before. And it was too hard to concentrate enough to form a rational thought with the scent of _them_ so heavy he could taste it.

After far too many minutes Stiles finally turned over and sat up so they could actually look at one another. He winced as the new position put pressure on the place where Derek was _locked inside him with his werewolf penis_ last night and Derek winced in sympathy. “My mind is just going around in circles at the moment. So before I say anything can I just check…” Stiles trailed off, and his eyes tracked down Derek’s torso to his crotch before locking on to their target.

For some reason, Stiles glaring at Derek’s penis like it disrespected him and his family is the thing that spurs him into talking, “Stiles, I’m so sorry, I wanted to tell you sooner, before we had sex, but I just—I… what are you doing?”

Stiles reached down to fondle Derek’s wolf-manhood like it was a piece of fruit in the supermarket that needed inspection before it was bought, and Derek, a bit shamefully, didn’t stop him from doing it. It was rude and more than a little bit inappropriate given the situation, but Derek had been expecting Stiles to never want anything to do with him ever again, and having Stiles play with his dick was a pleasant contrast.

“I can’t believe it,” Stiles gasped out like he had just discovered penicillin, not that _Derek’s dick got hard when he moved his hand up and down_ , “It’s almost normal, except…” Derek studiously averted his eyes as Stiles leaned close to his erection and eyed the small additional bulbous part that could grow into a not-so-small additional bulbous part if he tried hard enough. Stiles squeezed it a little and Derek _choked_ and put a foot between them on the bed.

“Stiles!” Derek wheezed, because he was _sensitive_ this morning, damn it! He snatched a pillow and placed it in front of his crotch, willing his erection to go down even though it was pretty much stuck now until he evacuated Stiles’ presence.

“Sorry, sorry, that was insensitive of me, wasn’t it?” Stiles checked, “It’s just so fascinating! Do lots of men have that and I just got a boring, normal dick? Or is it like a specific physical mutation you have? I’ve never seen something like that in porn, so it can’t be _that_ common. I need statistics, man!”

Derek felt like dying a bit then and there, because he was on his bed in the early hours of the morning listening to Stiles admitting to watching _porn_ and yet there wasn’t any time to get specifics about that particular detail. The more pressing matter? Stiles didn’t realise Derek was a werewolf. He thought he was just a mutant. Maybe it could be easier that way, maybe then Stiles wouldn’t feel as inclined to run for the hills, but Derek wasn’t about to bury himself and their relationship in a lie. He thought them better than that.

“Stiles, it’s not just me, but it’s also not a mutation. It’s a part of being born a—” Stiles’ eyes were wide, _too wide_ , and Derek faltered a moment. “It’s because I’m a—” Seriously, Stiles needed to stop it with the expressions because he was killing Derek here.

“Wizard!” Stiles declared, triumphantly, at the same moment that Derek said:

“Werewolf.”

“What?” they both shrieked, but then Stiles was _off_ on the biggest tirade Derek had ever seen.

“A werewolf? That’s crazy! Werewolves are real? Since when? Have they always been here, or are you here as some kind of force of nature to get us to do something about global warming? How many of you are there? Do you outnumber us regular people, or are you guys like only a few in the world kind of deal? Is it contagious? _Oh my god_ , am _I_ a werewolf now? Is that what your little penis display last night was about? Did you, like, inject me with your werewolf-ism jizz? Is that what it’s called: werewolf-ism? What happens on the full moon? Are there female werewolves or are all of you hunky dudes? Is it true that silver bullets are the only thing that can kill you? Not that I’d ever want to kill you, you’re far too handsome for that! I mean, maybe if you tried to eat me or something. _God_ , do you eat the hearts of poor humans? Is that why I’m here? Maybe we should establish pretty quickly what’s fact and what’s fiction because, I gotta warn ya, I’ve watched _a lot_ of supernatural movies and TV shows and that means I’ve got a lot of probably incorrect ideas already. Oh! What do you think of the portrayal of werewolves in cinema? Do you think it’s like racist or prejudiced or something, or do you love seeing your little wolf selves getting recognition like that? Derek? Derek!”

Derek snapped his head back and gasped like he’d been underwater. Already the overwhelming majority of Stiles’ rant was being disregarded by his one-track brain. In all the words that Stiles had proverbially spewed out onto Derek, only a few really stuck. “You still think I’m handsome?” he hazarded shyly, and Stiles glared at him like he’d grown another head.

“Ego, much?”

Derek inched back toward Stiles by walking on his knees and then heel sitting right up in his personal space. Stiles looked a bit taken aback, but he didn’t flinch away, didn’t have a sudden spike in his fear. He wasn’t afraid of Derek. He still used words like _hunky_ and _handsome_ to describe him, not _monster_. “I mean: you aren’t mad? Or scared?”

Stiles scoffed, “A little mad that you answered a grand total of _zero_ of my legitimate questions, and a little scared of some of the potential answers… but directed towards you?” he shook his head and Derek could hear that what he was saying was no lie, “Not at all—mm…” Stiles hummed into Derek’s mouth as the werewolf excitedly tackled him onto his back and _smothered_ him. “This isn’t some kind of tenderising process, I hope…” Stiles commented in breaths against his lips and Derek huffed a laugh right back at him.

Here, with Stiles caged beneath Derek’s body _willingly_ and as enthusiastic as he had been a couple days ago, he thinks maybe his daydream of their future doesn't quite beat the reality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all the support on this story!
> 
> I decided to add this second chapter.


	3. Developing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Derek & Stiles are still establishing things + Hale family feels

After Derek’s initial scare the morning after where he’d convinced himself that Stiles was moments from walking out of his life, it felt like they were back to some kind of normalcy. They had no reference point yet because it was still so early in their relationship, but he felt invariably more secure than he had before. It was like now they had a kind of mutual empathetic connection, whereas before Derek had been blindly grabbing at what his senses told him Stiles was feeling instead of what _Stiles_ told him he was feeling.

“So super strength, heightened agility, superior attractiveness…” Stiles counted off facts about werewolves on his hand while Derek fed him toast. Stiles was evidently not _just_ a sexy barista, he was also an incredibly inquisitive one. Where Derek was reading Stiles’ heart rate and fretful scent as fear of Derek being a werewolf, it was in actuality how Stiles expressed his _intense_ curiosity. Derek had tried all the stops to slow down Stiles’ initial interrogation, but even when he mushed their lips together, Stiles just kept talking. It was a little disheartening, especially because Derek _thought_ he’d be able to use his kissing prowess to render Stiles silent, but ultimately it was better that they got the conversation out of the way, anyway. Derek was just glad that they got through the basics without blowing Stiles' mind.

“Stiles, ‘superior attractiveness’ isn’t a werewolf thing,” he sighed, wanting to tack on _it’s a Derek Hale thing_ but he remembered another detail Stiles would love, “Oh! I forgot to mention, but we can also take pain.”

“What?” Stiles spat the toast which Derek had so kindly _hand-fed_ him all over the table. “You ‘ _forgot to mention_ ’?” he mimicked Derek awfully, but the werewolf was just a little chuffed that Stiles’ mimic gave Derek a deep voice. _Damn right he had a deep voice_. “That’s amazing! And kind of… nice. How does it work?”

Derek heaved a put-upon sigh (he was loving Stiles’ curiosity; it was immeasurably better than his abandonment) and went to feed him another piece of toast while the human digested the new piece of info. There was an out-of-place clang as Stiles picked up… the butter knife? And he turned it on himself while making eye contact with Derek, like he was going to—

“Don’t!” Derek roared, snatching the knife from Stiles’ grip with inhuman speed and throwing it across the room with such force it embedded itself in the plaster of a wall on the other side of the apartment. They both stared at it for a second, Derek heaving air into his lungs like he’d just been in a fight, and Stiles’ heart rabbit-fast in his ribcage. They turned back to look at one another at the same moment.

“Wow, so that’s what you look like when you shift,” Stiles commented. Up until now it had been intimate and harmless for Stiles to be analysing him like this, but after what Stiles just pulled… Derek focussed for a moment until he felt the shift slip back under his skin completely.

“What the hell was that, Stiles?” Derek snapped, but he already knew. He just wanted to hear Stiles say it, _needed_ to hear his mate say he understood the mistake.

“You said you could take pain so I… I was going to stab myself. Wow. Wow, dude, I can’t believe I got so dissociated like that. It’s like how when you’re so excited about something you just kind of bulldoze everything else in the way because you can only see that one thing.” Stiles gasped, but his heart was easing down again, “How do people normally respond? God, I’ve been treating you like a big ol’ textbook instead of a super-hot boyfriend.”

 _Mate_ , Derek corrected in his head, but he couldn’t drop the M-bomb on Stiles just yet. He rested their foreheads together and huffed a breath against Stiles’ face, consoling himself in the intoxicating scent of _Stiles plus Derek_. “You’re doing perfectly fine, Stiles. Maybe we should bring you back to reality for now, though,” a tiny noise of protest started to brew in Stiles’ throat and Derek interjected fast, “We’ll have plenty of time to talk about this stuff, I promise. For now let’s focus on staying fed and hydrated, hm?”

“Whatever, Sourwolf,” Stiles jested, and Derek could already tell that Stiles was going to concoct a series of very colourful nicknames for him that he was going to hate. “It’s unfair that you’re still so handsome shifted.”

Maybe Derek filed that information away for later, but nobody was to know.

-

There wasn’t another issue until later that day when Stiles, well, tried to _leave_.

“Where are you going?” Derek blocked Stiles’ exit and stated in a tone that _wasn’t_ accusatory. Not too much, anyway.

“Um, I was just gonna run home—” Derek had to actually _bite_ his tongue to stop from telling Stiles that _home is here now_ , “—and wash my clothes for the week. Saturday is the day I normally do laundry, so...”

“You weren’t gonna let me know you were leaving?” Derek _didn’t_ say it sulkily.

“Well you were in the bathroom and I wrote a note and I kind of have some housework to do as well so—” he went over to the table, grabbed a piece of paper and handed it to Derek. Sure enough, it said pretty much what Stiles had already summarised. The paper slipped from Derek’s hands. “If you want me to stay for a bit longer, that’s alright, I’ve got all day.”

It hit Derek then that just because Stiles had taken the whole werewolf thing well didn’t actually mean that they were more serious than they were. They didn’t _live together_ , they’d literally had two total dates and had sex once. It was a shame that they didn’t quite reach the _knotting_ and _mates_ chapter before Derek had put a stop to the whole werewolf interrogation. And Derek was still haunted by Stiles’ defensive reaction to Derek’s concern for his residency on their first date, so he sure as hell knew better than to poke that particular bear when they were already in such a precariously good space.

“No, that’s all good,” Derek dismissed, playing it casual. He stepped aside from blocking the doorway even though every instinct was telling him to _keep your mate in your den_. “I’ll see you for lunch on Monday?”

Stiles grinned, opening the door and standing in the threshold, “For sure! I’ve got all kinds of other werewolf information I need to weasel out of you.”

Derek grinned back as he gave Stiles a parting kiss. He deepened the kiss when Stiles started to step back, wrapping one arm around Stiles’ hips and using the other to cradle the human’s head in the _perfect_ position for Derek. Stiles wasn’t exactly complaining, but as Derek caught himself subconsciously backing them up into the apartment again, he realised that if he didn’t let Stiles leave now, he might never be able to. Their relationship wasn’t dominated by the wolf, it was also human, and a human needed time to develop and reciprocate the kind of connection Derek had already made.

“Wow, yeah,” Stiles panted, looking appropriately dishevelled, “Yep, lunch on Monday. I can wait ‘til then for more of that, definitely. Maybe.”

Then, like that, Stiles was off. Derek hovered in the doorway to his apartment and stalked him with his olfactory senses until he _disappeared_ , slipped through Derek’s fingers and back out into the world. The _awful_ world where Stiles’ had a shitty apartment and an even shittier landlord and Derek wasn’t allowed to _keep him_ because Stiles was too damn stubborn and independent.

Derek paced for a solid twenty minutes just trying to convince himself that Stiles was perfectly fine even without Derek around.

Then, when that didn’t work, he retreated to the bed where the scent of Stiles, sweat, sex and sodomy was still ripe. Derek was _never_ changing his sheets again. Not unless Stiles was there to rub himself all over them again when they were clean.

Laying in the spot where just a delicate twelve hours earlier he had given Stiles _everything_ , he could feel his body getting some aftershocks of excitement from proximity. He stared at his erection as it rapidly grew, but then, in a very abnormal way, he didn’t do anything about it. He just stared at it some more, and after a moment he realised that the reason he didn’t want to do anything about it was because he wanted _Stiles_ to do something about it instead. The poor thing was just confused because the scent of Stiles was so strong still.

“Down, boy,” Derek ordered, and relaxed back onto his bed. He lay his head back on the pillow Stiles had slept on and star-fished out on the bed. He was a strong, independent werewolf, and he could get through the 48 hours before he got to see Stiles again.

-

Saturday passed uneventfully, albeit lonelily, and Derek thought that maybe the whole ‘mates’ thing had peaked hard and fast; that it wasn’t as bad as he had suspected after the intensity of the morning.

Sunday proved him wrong. Oh, how it had proved him wrong.

He slept fitfully, stuck in a recursive dream where he walked in to the café to find Stiles laughing captivatingly and baring his throat to a hulking Alpha werewolf. _Tell me more about how Alphas have larger cocks than Betas_ , Stiles’ voice had carried to him in the dream, _show me, Alpha, give me your knot, right here, take me_. In the dream, that was when Derek had flown through the shop to get to Stiles, to challenge the Alpha, to _kill_ , but when he got close, Stiles would hold himself hostage with a knife pressed against his jugular. _You can take my pain, right?_

Derek woke up and ripped his bedsheets to shreds in a panic. He was halfway to the ground floor of his building, still in his boxers, when he regained enough of a foothold in his own body to shamefully trudge back to his apartment. He sat in bed for most of the day, feeling hollow and counting down the seconds until he could leave for work the next morning. He had to change the bedsheets, albeit reluctantly, after he’d destroyed them, which meant that the scent of Stiles was rapidly fading from the apartment. Stiles texted him a few times, but Derek somehow convinced himself to not even respond. _Can’t be too needy_ , he assured himself, but before he went to sleep that night, he sent Stiles a picture of himself with his Beta eyes glowing so that it made the camera flare. _We also aren’t very photogenic_ he sent, to which Stiles replied with himself pulling an awful, but endearing face, _that must mean I’m a werewolf too?!_.

-

Sunday night he didn’t have the disturbing dreams, but he did wake up on Monday morning with a bit of an embarrassing sob-yawn and an ache in his chest.

He pulled his morning routine methodically, hastily, and then practically bolted out the door. He actually got to the café before it even opened, and when they finally opened the doors he barged through and looked around frantically before remembering that Stiles’ shift didn’t even start until later. They’d agreed to have _lunch_ , not breakfast.

Feeling like an idiot, Derek ordered a coffee and then went to work, still counting down in his head the moments until lunch.

He was daydreaming in his office about what to do for his and Stiles’ next date when Laura marched in. He leapt about a foot in the air because he was an _idiot_ at the moment, and she didn’t even need to take a whiff of the air to know exactly what was going on.

“This is about that person from the other day, isn’t it? The one that had you stinking up the building with your sexual frustration?” she steamrolled through _all_ of Derek’s comfort zones, “Did you finally do it? When do I get to meet her?”

“Him,” Derek corrected. It was only one word, but he regretted it immediately because that was like dousing an ember with gasoline.

“Him?” she queried, interest in Derek’s personal life piqued, though that wasn’t difficult because 99% of the time there was nothing to tell. She closed his door behind herself so that they could have a _family conversation_. Derek wasn’t ready for this. “I never picked you for the kind to want to take one up the bum.”

“Actually, he was the one that took it,” _kill me_ , Derek thought as his traitorous mouth worked, “But if he wanted me to…” he trailed off, _thank god_.

“Nice, Derek!” Laura encouraged, as she always did. Derek never forgot that Laura was his Alpha, how could he? Sometimes, though, he would be a bit caught off-guard by having his wolf preening under the scrutiny of his sister. They both missed mum, and everyone else they’d lost… that pain was always fresh, but sometimes the reminder that the Hale family was still _alive_ , that they weren’t broken, could be a Band-Aid on it for a few moments. “Gave it to him good, huh? I’d like to meet him.”

Derek thought about Stiles meeting Laura. They’d get along. In-fact, Derek could see Stiles getting along with all of his (albeit small, now) family. Even Peter, Derek’s uncle who was a bit less present than the rest of them. But Derek didn’t want to get too caught up in the thought of their future together in case his missed out on the present. “I’d like that, too. Not yet, though, we’re still… new.”

Derek’s heart beat a total of five times, and on the fifth beat Laura’s face scrunched up a little and she declared confidently: “You told him about us.”

“Yeah, I kind of had to,” Derek admitted. It was no point trying to hide anything from Laura. What she didn’t pick up on with her intuition, she could pick up on with her Alpha talents. Besides, while Cora and Peter went their separate ways, Laura had been all Derek had for a long time. There were no secrets between them. “I knotted him.”

Laura had just taken a seat, and a sip of Derek’s glass of water when he dropped the K-word and she spat a stream of it onto his desk. “Wow, that’s…” she grabbed a few tissues and dabbed them over the wettest parts of his desk, “that’s big, Der. And you’ve only known one another…”

“A couple weeks now,” he told her, taking the tissues from her hand and finishing off the wipe-down himself. He’d have to print out a new copy of the pamphlet he’d been pretending to read while he day-dreamed, but thankfully the rest of the damage was minimal.

“You know that for a lot of people it takes a couple months at least to develop that kind of connection,” Derek nodded, he did know, “That’s incredible. That’s really special. After K—”

“Don’t say her name,” Derek winced, jammed his eyes shut and hid his claws under the desk.

Laura snatched his right wrist and pulled it back up onto the desk. She splayed it wide and then put her hand in his, “After _Kate Argent_ , you deserve somebody special like this boy.” She never had any trouble saying the name of the woman which slaughtered them, the woman which Derek had let into their lives. She never even blamed him, even though she really should have. Laura was stronger than him in so many ways, and he was grateful every day that it was Laura that inherited their mother’s status and not him. “Whatever you need, whatever he needs, I’m always here, Derek. We’re in this together.”

“We are,” he agreed, “thanks Laura.”

“Any time,” she stood up, “I need you to follow up with the admin team today. They’ve got a suspiciously high staff turn-over and I’m getting pretty sick of training new people. Fix it.” She opened the door without looking before loudly _embarrassing him_ , “And stop _glowing_ Derek, we get it, you got laid!”

Derek cursed his hearing as he heard a dozen of the staff outside suddenly start churning out gossip about who it is he’s supposedly been laid by.

Their family was definitely not broken, but sometimes they could be just a _little bit_ frustrating.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh no, I'm actually starting to come up with a plot for this when it was supposed to be a one-shot... these short chapters are me being indecisive about whether to jam out an actual story or not.


	4. Affectionate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The rest of Monday.

Even after Laura’s visit lunch felt like it was taking eons to come. Derek occupied himself doing actual work instead of daydreaming, catching up on some of the things he’d put on the backburner last week and making a few calls he’d been procrastinating on.

“Is this Mrs Morrell?” Derek queried into his phone lazily. He’d been on hold for about fifteen minutes longer than he’d normally tolerate and was starting to lose faith that he’d ever get a hold of the client he was calling for.

“Yes, that’s my name. Who’s calling?”

“My name is Derek Hale from the Hale Corporation and I…” he trailed off because he caught sight of the time. It was five past twelve. He was five minutes into his lunch break. He was missing out on _Stiles-time_ right now. “I’m sorry, I have to go,” he declared into the phone urgently and then disconnected the call before he could stop himself.

He barrelled out of his office and _ran_ like he was being chased by a bullet. On the top floor of the fifty-storey he saw the express elevator close before he could get to it, _of course_ , and diverted to the stairs. He leapt over railings and flew down flights at a time. When he got to the ground floor, he slipped through the throng of people milling about the reception area and out the door onto the street. He heard the _ding!_ of the elevator as it reached the bottom.

He threw open the door to the coffee shop in much a similar fashion that he had earlier in the morning, only this time Stiles was actually there, in their usual booth. A few of the patrons gave him the side-eye for his dramatics, but Derek was busy being captivated by one set of eyes in particular.

“Well look what the wolf dragged in,” Stiles commented. Derek marched over and lifted him easily up and into his arms and _squeezed_. Stiles felt warm and soft in his arms, and Derek’s heart felt like it was trying to evacuate his body through his throat— _when did it become so hard to breathe_ —but each lungful of Stiles he inhaled soothed him. He caught himself subconsciously rubbing Stiles all over himself in subtle little shifting movements and then realised he needed to _stop_. They were in the middle of Stiles’ workplace, his _public_ workspace. Whoops.

“Sorry,” Derek’s voice broke and he cleared his throat before repeating himself, “Sorry.”

“Don’t be, dude, that was adorable,” Stiles assured him, and they sat down so that everybody else could get back to _minding their own business_ , “We’re gonna be so sickeningly cute together, I can already tell.” He punctuated the statement by slotting their ankles together under the table.

“Yeah,” Derek agreed, and took a sip of the coffee which Stiles had pre-emptively made for him. They were gonna be the cutest damn couple ever.

“I think my co-workers know I’m into dudes now,” Stiles said, offhand, gesturing at a pack of people around Stiles’ age that were whispering at the counter. Derek sobered.

“Sorry, I didn’t—”

“Wolfy, dude,” Stiles interjected, and Derek wasn’t too sure how much he liked being ‘dude-zoned’ by Stiles, “it’s all good. Just because I don’t include it in my introductions to people doesn’t mean I’m embarrassed by it. Besides, now I get to make them all jealous because of my big, beefy boyfriend.” _Damn right_. Derek was a catch, Stiles was a catch, and together they were perfect.

“ _Erica… I think that’s Derek Hale!_ ” one of Stiles’ co-workers uttered.

“ _Don’t be ridiculous Isaac, Derek Hale wouldn’t be—_ ” ‘Erica’ stuttered to a stop, “ _Oh my God that’s Derek Hale! Boyd, come look!_ ”

“What’s wrong?” Stiles’ voice cut through, Derek’s hearing easily and automatically readjusting to focus on the most important person.

“They know who I am,” Derek informed, taking a sip from his coffee. At Stiles’ puzzled, conspiratorial look Derek elaborated, “Your co-workers.”

His mate cast a look back at his colleagues at the counter, then Derek, then his colleagues, then Derek again. He leaned in close, disconnecting their ankles, “Is that alright? I mean, am I going to, like, damage your image or something if we’re seen in public together?”

Derek snorted. Seriously, Derek Hale didn’t have an _image_. He had his last name plastered on pretty much every sporting even in the city, but apart from that all he had was a twisted mention of his supposedly frivolous lifestyle in a few gossip magazines. It’s not like he was a household name, or people stopped him in the streets for autographs. “Not at all. And even if it did, I wouldn’t care. I’d sooner abandon the Hale Corporation before I even thought about leaving you.” Stiles wasn’t a werewolf, but if he were then he’d hear that every word Derek said was sincere.

They sat in silence for a moment, the only sound the slurping of their coffees and the munching of the assorted sandwiches Stiles had ordered them for their lunch. It felt like Derek had maybe come on too strong, which was probably bound to happen now and then considering Stiles was his _mate_.

“Sorry if that was a bit much.”

“Dude,” Stiles groaned again, _dude_ , ugh, “Stop apologising for being adorable. I mean, you don’t see me doing it.” And Stiles winked. “Besides, I was just thinking about tonight.”

It was bait. It _had_ to be bait. Derek still shamelessly swallowed it whole. He leaned forward eagerly so that they were just a few delicious inches apart. “What’s happening tonight?”

“I’m glad you asked,” Stiles teased, and Derek’s heart skipped a beat as the human’s eyes darted down to Derek’s lips for a split-second. “I was thinking we have dinner at mine and then get into some kinky Little Red Riding Hood roleplay…”

“What?”

“Kidding!” he corrected, but then left the record smudged by tacking on, “Mostly. What I really wanted to do, though, was watch some classic werewolf movies with you so you could point out what’s accurate and what’s not.”

“No kinky roleplay?” Derek checked, and he wasn’t sure whether he was disappointed or not, which was probably cause for concern.

“Mm, you want me to say _my, what a big dick you have_ , babe?” Stiles asked, and Derek felt all fuzzy inside. _Babe_. It wasn’t quite _mate_ , but it was closer than _dude_. The feeling wasn’t even soured by the elderly woman sitting nearby giving them a judgmental glare.

“I don’t need any reassurances, but if you must.”

“Please, I could wrote odes to your—” Stiles mistakenly made peripheral eye-contact with the woman, “soul. Can I get an Amen?”

Derek scoffed and playfully kicked Stiles under the table.

-

They agreed on dinner at eight, but unfortunately that meant that Derek had a whole two hours to sit around and twiddle his thumbs. He also did a couple hundred sit-ups, telling himself that Stiles would appreciate his abdomen more if it was just a _bit_ more defined.

Even after showering, cleaning up the kitchen and making his bed, he still had time to spare, so he caved and headed out. He was standing outside his door, key turning to lock the door, when he heard a minute gasp from his neighbour, Mrs Landers. He gave her an amicable smile and then turned back to his task when he realised his mistake.

Clothes.

He needed them.

“Shit, sorry Mrs Landers!” he called, trying to unlock the door and get back inside, but apparently unlocking the door was immeasurably more difficult than locking it. Entropy, and all that.

-

Derek would probably never get used to where Stiles was living temporarily. _Temporarily_ , because as soon as it was reasonable, Derek was getting the stubborn little human _out_ of there and into somewhere more… suitable. Like Derek’s room, or whatever.

He could even find it in himself to maybe overlook the very foundations of the building as they audibly creaked and groaned with the stress of maintaining their structural integrity, but overlooking _Theo Raeken_ was a bit more difficult.

“You’re here to see Stiles?” the landlord checked, as if it was any of his business, when Derek stepped inside the building (could it even really be called a building? More like an overgrown hovel). Derek grunted in affirmation, showing his teeth in a smile which wasn’t anything close to sincere. “Aren’t you a bit old for him?”

Derek just kept walking, because he knew that if he didn’t he’d notice that Theo wasn’t even _wrong_ , what the fuck. Derek wasn’t exactly an old man, but Stiles was so _young_. He was a solid six years older than his mate, and it hadn’t even occurred to him until he had it pointed out to him by some pervert. Kate was older than Derek when she’d… well, when she’d _happened_ to him, for lack of a better term. Maybe Derek had some kind of sick complex because of it?

He shook away the thoughts easily as he approached Stiles’ apartment. Derek knocked on Stiles’ door firmly and—the door fell open.

“Yeah, it does that,” Stiles acknowledged casually from somewhere inside. He was wearing an apron and aggressively draining some spaghetti, “Nice night, isn’t it? Thought we’d have pasta because, well, I love pasta.”

“Your door here doesn’t lock?” Derek affirmed, bristling. _Anyone_ could just waltz right in.

“Sometimes it just won’t open, if that counts,” Stiles answered as he snapped the oven off with a flourish and whipped out two bowls. “Come on, let’s eat! You got here at just the right time, it must be kismet.”

Derek breathed in and out and counted to ten, pointedly not mentioning that Stiles didn’t seem to recognise that his place _sucked_ , because nobody liked being told that they lived in a shithole. “Lucky, I’m starving,” he said instead, “We also have extra mighty appetites; so be sure to always cook for a third person if I’m around.”

“I’m assuming that if I don’t, you’d take a bit out of me instead?” Stiles jabbed as they took their seats on a couch that smelled of water damage. Was it too early in their relationship for Derek to buy Stiles furniture? Honestly, Derek would turn Stiles’ world upside down if the human would let him.

“Obviously,” Derek teased, showing his teeth before shovelling pasta, sauce and cheese into his mouth. Stiles was a good cook, but that didn’t surprise Derek. “Still might.”

-

They watched werewolf movies, _is this racist? If this is racist, let me know, Derek. I don’t want to be an asshole, I just want to watch hunky, furry men pin poor, unsuspecting humans to various surfaces for… science_ , Derek corrected pretty much every observation Stiles made, _I’m not going to go on a killing spree on the full moon, Stiles. I just drive out to the preserve, run around until I get tired, and then take a day off… what, are you disappointed that I’m not going to hunt you down and maim you? Unbelievable, Stiles_ , and then, somehow, both of their clothes vanished.

“Wow, you’re really, really fit, aren’t you?” Stiles observed, a bit awed by Derek’s abs, it seemed, as he trailed his finger across the hard planes of muscle. _Score_!

“You’re not,” Derek smirked, flipping Stiles off of the couch and onto the floor, following the movement bodily and breaking the fall with a hand on the small of the human’s back. “Practically no resistance.”

Stiles surged up suddenly and caught Derek in a searing kiss that had him pushing Stiles into the floor and _writhing_ on top of him. God, it was something else entirely when his senses got overwhelmed by Stiles like this. Next thing he knew, he was on his back, Stiles crouched over him and grinning so wide that Derek could _feel_ it against his face. “ _Practically no resistance_ ,” he parroted now that their positions had been reversed, “You can be a big macho werewolf all you want, but don’t underestimate the power of the Stilinski h—holy shit!”

Stiles bit off his statement and held on for dear life as Derek used his strength to stand up, taking Stiles with him and holding him in the air with just one hand under his thigh. It probably looked like some kind of an optical illusion to an outside observer. So yeah, Derek was fit, thank you very much. “You were saying?”

Stiles wrapped his legs around Derek’s middle, “So hot,” he declared, and Derek’s follow-up statement was swallowed up by the soft, warm, _sexy_ human. They shared few messy, grinning kisses, and then Derek’s grip began to go a bit weak and he deposited Stiles in the middle of the couch, his legs still bracketing the werewolf’s hips. Stiles was literally spreading his legs for Derek, he looked down and saw Stiles’ prominent erection, and of course, his hot little hole. Derek’s erection was pointing at Stiles like it knew _where_ it was supposed to go in, it was just waiting for Derek to piston his hips forwards a bit.

“So, I prepped myself while I was making the pasta,” Stiles offered, which _unsanitary_ and _gross_ , but also kind of hot. “I mean when I was waiting for the water to boil, and I washed my hands after, I wasn’t standing around with one hand up my ass and another grating cheese. Get your little werewolf brain out of the gutter, please.” Derek, to his own credit, was too stuck admiring every inch of Stiles laid before him to feel chagrined. “There’s some lube on the kitchen counter, though, if you think we’ll still need it.”

“Definitely,” Derek decided. He could already tell that he was going to pop his knot again, which meant that Stiles probably, really, really, needed to know about werewolf mates and the significance of it all, but it also meant that Stiles needed things to be as smooth and slippery as possible. Call Derek an outlier, but his priorities were far more with _smooth and slippery_ at the moment. He darted over to the counter and then back, feeling like he was in some kind of fever dream as he approached Stiles holding his legs wide, knees up to expose himself so beautifully for him.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” Stiles murmured, and Derek had a crazy moment where he was about to _get his phone and take a picture_ before he came back to reality and remembered he had a mission: get his cock all up in Stiles’ everything.

He only took a moment to slick himself up and ensure that Stiles wasn’t lying when he’d said he’d prepared himself (he hadn’t been lying, and Derek tried not to get too caught up imagining Stiles preparing himself for Derek), before he started to push his dick inside. The fat head tunnelled in to the crown when Stiles startled him with a shouted: “Wait!”

“What is it?” Derek checked, voice sounding deeper than normal, a bit more of his wolf bleeding through than he’d let during the only other time they’d had sex, “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, just thought I’d make you suffer. Maybe I should freak you out like that every time we do it.”

When Derek was younger and he and Cora had giggled and shared their fantasies of their ideal future mates and what they’d do, he could honestly say that in none of his fantasies he uttered the words, “You’re an evil, evil person,” while he pushed inside to the hilt.

“You love me,” Stiles sighed out as his body adjusted to the intrusion. Derek’s dick was an intruder, and if that wasn’t a summary of their relationship so far then Derek didn’t know what was.

Derek held his breath until Stiles gave him a slight nod to signal he could move. He manoeuvred so that Stiles’ ass was hanging off the couch, “Definitely. I love you. I definitely do,” Derek agreed quickly, slowly setting himself up for the motions by pulling out to the crown and then going as deep as he could again and again. Stiles didn’t love Derek yet, and that was fine, as long as he was fine with Derek loving him in the interim. 

Stiles would catch up eventually—

“I love you too, Derek.”

—or immediately. 

Derek made eye contact with Stiles, the sight of Stiles professing his love arguably more beautiful than the sight of Derek’s member disappearing inside of him. He leaned down and mashed their mouths together in hopefully a romantic way (honestly, it was just to stop himself from one-upping Stiles and saying _well, I love you for life! Hah!_ ). Then he started thrusting hard and fast into Stiles without warning, keeping their faces close so could feel every puff of air that was punched out of him, could drink in the sound of Stiles’ moans in stereo. Everything felt inordinately _more_ like this. It was like Stiles wasn’t just letting Derek stick himself inside and wiggle around, it was like they were _sharing_ everything that it was physically possible for them to.

Derek felt his knot catch on Stiles’ rim and then he was gone, too inundated in the scent of sex and sweat to pull himself back from the precipice. “ _Stiles_!” he moaned out in a mess of extra syllables. “God, Stiles,” everything tingled right down to the balls of his feet as his cock got locked into place. “Ung!”

The first, massive pulse of his cock felt like it physically shook him, and he held on for dear life as they kept on coming and coming (pun intended). The muscles of Stiles’ ass tightened and contracted erratically after a few moments and the scent of the human’s release hit Derek’s nose. It was incredible. Sex with Stiles was always going to be incredible. Probably better once they both could last a little bit longer, but for now Derek was more than happy with their two experienced thus far. His ‘little Derek’ certainly wasn’t complaining as he remained firmly seated inside of Stiles.

Only now, it really hit him that they’d done it in the most uncomfortable position possible. Stiles was folded up over himself, ass on display with a _tennis ball_ shoved up there along with an ever-increasing amount of Derek’s spunk. Derek was stuck in a kind of squat that had seemed perfect moments earlier because it gave him the _best_ angle to get into Stiles’ ass, but now it was kind of domineering and far-away. Derek wanted to _cuddle_ , damn it.

“So how long does this usually last?” Stiles checked, and wow, rude. Here Derek was, having potentially the most prolonged orgasm he’d ever had, and Stiles was wanting it to be done and dusted now that he’d gotten his own rocks off. “Not that I want it to be over or anything, it’s just my back is a little bit sore maybe.” Oh.

“Sorry, I’ll just—” he made to move them, and they both moaned from the mix of pleasure-pain that followed. “Just bear with me,” Derek assured Stiles, trying to ignore the fact that he was _still going_ in favour of helping Stiles get comfortable. They ended up in a position that was a bit better, with Stiles sitting spread-eagled on Derek’s lap. It was… nice.

“So maybe next time we do it on a bed again,” Stiles proposed.

“God, yes,” Derek agreed, “Lesson learned, this time.” It felt like something else needed to be said. It just felt wrong to have just done what they did, the _amazing_ thing they did, and not have something great to say about it. “Nice, uh,” he cleared his throat awkwardly, not like he could really look away from Stiles at this point, “nice job. Well done.”

Stiles stared at him for a moment, whole expression some mix of incredulous and gleeful. _Too gleeful_ for a person with a werewolf jizzing inside of them.

“Shut up, I’m trying to say we did great.”

“Please always tell me ‘well done’ after sex, Derek,” Stiles cackled, the movement of his diaphragm making him bounce on Derek’s dick, though, so Derek wasn’t quite cognizant enough to complain about the mockery. Stiles’ eyes fell down to where they were connected and he spoke as if to their array of genitalia, “ _Well done_ guys.”

“Alright, give me another few minutes and then I should be able to pull out and, y’know, stick my head in your oven.”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Stiles critiqued, “Though it is a gas oven, so technically…” he trailed off.

“I’m sorry I brought it up,” Derek chuckled. He really did have a perfect mate for him. One might see them and say: ‘opposites attract’, but really they were so similar where it counted. Their sense of humour, their morals, and their strengths of character. “Do you mind if I stay the night?” Derek asked, and he could see in Stiles’ expression that he knew by now that there was something more that Derek’s dick was trying to tell him. Stiles gently lifted himself up, tugging gently on the slightly inflated bulge of the knot until the whole member slipped out in a single, wet mess. Derek could smell the tangy scent of his own semen deep, deep inside Stiles, where it belonged.

“Only if you promise to help clean up in the morning,” Stiles yawned, looking disapprovingly at the wet spot on the couch.

Derek stood up, knees trembling a little bit, and his still-softening dick swung from side to side like a particularly satisfied metronome. _Well done_. “I promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first chapter was a few weeks. The past three chapters have only been the course of 3 days. Definitely slowed down, but no regrets.
> 
> I also have a dangerous habit of writing the sex more detailed than any other part of the story.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


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